other men were still
finishing their slumbers. His shyness and sensitiveness, combined with
precarious health and weak physique, would seem to equip him but poorly
in the struggle for life; but his steady persistence, his high
conception of duty, his faith in his art, joined to that power which he
had of winning friends among the noblest men and women of his day, were
to carry him triumphantly through to the end.

The career of Watts as a public man began in 1843 when he had reached
the age of 26. The British Government, not often guilty of fostering art
or literature, may claim at least the credit for having drawn him out of
his seclusion at the very moment when his genius was ripening to bear
fruit. In 1834 the Palace of Westminster, so long the home of the Houses
of Parliament, had been burnt to the ground. The present buildings were
begun by Sir Charles Barry in 1840, and, with a view to decorating them
with wall-paintings, the Board of Works wisely offered prizes for
cartoons, hoping thereby to attract the best talent of the country. In
June 1843 they had to judge between 140 designs by various competitors,
and to award prizes varying in value from L300 to L100. Of the three
first prizes one fell to Watts, hitherto unknown beyond the narrow
circle of his friends, for a design displaying 'Caractacus led in
triumph through the streets of Rome'. This cartoon, however, was not
employed for its original purpose: it fell into the hands of an
enterprising, if inartistic, dealer, who cut it up and sold such
fragments as he judged to be of value in the state of the picture market
at the time. What was far more important was the encouragement given to
the artist by such a success at a critical time of his life, and the
opportunity which the money furnished him to travel abroad and enrich
his experiences before his style was formed. He had long wished to visit
Italy; and, after spending a few weeks in France, he made his leisurely
way (at a pace incredible to us to-day) to Florence and its picture
galleries. On the steamer between Marseilles and Leghorn he was
fortunate in making friends with a Colonel Ellice and his wife, and a
few weeks later they introduced him to Lord Holland, the British
Minister at Florence.

The story goes that Watts went to be the guest of Lord and Lady Holland
for four days and remained there for four years--a story which is a
tribute to the discernment of the latter and not a satire upon Watts,
wh